mad in pursuit family history

Patrick Barrett and Mary Gardiner Barrett were
the earliest of my ancestors to come to America. They were refugees of
the Great Hunger -- the Irish Potato Famine (1845-1851).

We think that both Patrick Barrett and Mary Gardiner Barrett arrived in
America at the Port of New Orleans. They escaped from famine just in
time to hit the yellow fever in New Orleans [4] — then weathered the
cholera epidemic in St. Louis — a hardy pair.

Mary. By the Barrett family account [2], Mary arrived with her brother,
but he fell victim to the fever and died. I haven't been able to find the
record of her passage. Somehow Mary was able to make her way to St
Louis.

Patrick. The ship records at Castle Garden [3] yielded
the most likely record for Patrick and his family: Arrival on the ship
Mertoun [7] on May 10, 1847. A follow-up
at Ancestry [5] revealed some information we hadn't been
aware of — that Patrick
traveled not only with his parents Martin and Nelly, but with 5 siblings:
Thomas, Martin, Catherine, John, and Sally. What happened to them?

None of our previous family records indicates any information about siblings
(or the mother) in the St Louis area. We only find Martin, living with
Patrick and Mary in the 1850 census (below).

There were 253 passengers who began the trip to New Orleans. 9 died along
the way. The trip may have taken about 9 weeks [7]. An ordeal.

From New
Orleans Online: "As New Orleans was a thriving port city, the itineraries
of many boats ended here and the passengers simply stayed. In addition,
Irish immigrants often found cheap passage to New Orleans because after
cotton ships unloaded their cargo in Liverpool, captains needed to
load their holds up with human ballast for the return trip. Conditions,
needless to say, were far from ideal." (See also Note [6]).

Speculations: It cost money to make the passage from New
Orleans to St Louis — maybe the able-bodied
Martin and Patrick took off for parts north to make their fortunes,
and planned to send for the others. What happened to the
others? Did they stay in New Orleans? Did they settle up river? Did
they succumb to yellow fever or other ills of swampy river valleys
and miserable living conditions?

Marriage: Pat and Mary wed on
October 21 1849, in St. Louis. My mother reports that "when they lived in the city... it
was on Green Street between Fifth and Sixth Streets... a block north
of Washington Avenue."

The marriage record below states: "State of Missouri, County of St Louis:
I certify that I have joined in the holy bands of Matrimony on the
21 day of October 1849, Patrick Barret [sic] and Mary Gardiner; certified
by me this 18th day of January A.D. 1850. A. Damen, Catholic Priest.
File and recorded January 19th 1850. S. D. Barlow Recorder."

1850 Census: It would not be surprising for immigrants
to dodge the census-taker, just like they do today. Being countedby
the government
has dark overtones for the refugee. So there were only 2 Patrick
Barretts reported in 1850: a 12-year-old and the one below, captured
on 27 August 1850. [Click on image below to get the whole page.]

This one is likely to be them. Their first son's name was
John and he was born in 1850. They
list this child as being 4 months old, so either he was premature or
Mary decided her biological clock was ticking and planned a shotgun
wedding. (It says she's 30 if I'm reading the handwriting correctly.)
Street addresses are not listed in the 1850 census, so we don't know
how it tracks with the address my mother got in researching their marriage.

Also in the household was a 60-year-old Martin
Barrett. We assume this is Patrick's father, primarily because Pat and
Mary named a latter child Martin. They were living with another family,
the Owens.

What doesn't fit: Making all this data jibe takes a little imagination
and a belief that census-takers were highly prone to error — a given.

The 1850 census says this Mary was born in Missouri and we
know our Mary was born in Ireland.

Then there is Patrick's age — 19 in 1847 but 30 in 1850?
Grrr... But his age listings are full of discrepancies throughout his
lifetime:

"most [famine] Irish who arrived at the port of New Orleans stayed in the
city, primarily because they could not afford passage farther inland.
Crowding into the city's riverfront neighborhoods, they strained its
limited housing, employment, and education. Forced to compete with slaves
and free blacks at the bottom of the economy, many New Orleans Irish took
low-paying, often dangerous manual jobs, such as digging canals and
ditches, building roads, levees, and railroads, and laboring on the
docks and in the warehouses. The mortality rate was especially high
among canal diggers, who were highly susceptible to yellow fever, malaria,
and cholera." [Source]

[7] The ship name "Yucatan," listed in Castle Rock and Ancestry, is an error
in transcribing the handwriting. The Yucatan was not in service at
this time. The ship was the Mertoun (Captain Hamilton) -- see this listing
from The Ships List . An autumn voyage of this ship that same year took
about 9 weeks to complete.